


Pumpkin Spice

by orphan_account



Series: SPN Writing Challenge [13]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, Fluff, M/M, Pre-Slash, Teacher Dean, Witch Castiel, Witch Claire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-30
Updated: 2016-09-30
Packaged: 2018-08-18 14:39:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,156
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8165435
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Dean's new neighbor is a blue-eyed nature witch with forget-me-nots in his hair.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [SPN Writing Challenge](spnwritingchallenge.tumblr.com) September 2016 "autumn"-themed prompt "jack-o-lantern." 
> 
> i recently discovered a love for urban fantasy aus, so i thought why not end this challenge how i started: with a witch au. 
> 
> it's been an incredibly fun year writing for the swc. i'm happy to have been able to participate so much, and i will definitely miss looking forward to a prompt each month. thank you to the mods at spn writing challenge for their hard work and dedication to this challenge. y'all done good ♡

It’s a chilly October morning when the apartment next to his finally fills, and Dean watches from his window with a fresh brewed cup of coffee as the moving truck is unloaded. They keep pretty quiet for the most part, seeing as how it’s barely six and the goddamn sun is just starting to peek over the horizon. Good. Considerate neighbors are always a nice thing to have.

Dean sips at his coffee, wondering absently what his new neighbor is like for a brief moment, then leaves his window to finish getting ready for work. He gets all his lesson plans together, grabs the graded homework, and is out the door half an hour later.

As he’s unlocking the Impala, Dean glances over to see a man walking out of the apartment and to the moving truck. His dark hair is wild and mussed, his sweater a soft-looking blue cashmere, and his jeans are paint-stained and well-worn. He doesn’t have shoes on.

He looks over at Dean and offers a bright, kind smile and wave, and Dean is completely frozen with awe when the dying grass beneath his bare feet surges with life, becoming a vibrant, healthy green, and small, delicate flowers suddenly sprout with each of his steps towards the truck.

Dean barely remembers to wave back before he’s in his car and driving away, and he can’t get his mind to think about anything but the friggin’ _miracle_ he just witnessed for the rest of his day.

His new neighbor is a _witch._ Wow.

Dean had dated a witch once, during undergrad. Her name was Anna, and she’d specialized in scrying. She could find literally anything, from lost house keys to estranged relatives. It was pretty cool, and handy on more than one occasion when Dean misplaced his homework or dorm room key.

And a few years ago, Sam had introduced him to his then-girlfriend now-future wife Jessica, who is a witch with an affinity for healing magic, and is currently an RN in training. They’d met at Stanford and hit it off immediately, and Dean couldn’t be happier for them.

But other than Anna and Jess, Dean hasn’t really met any witches. Not many live in the small town of Lawrence, Kansas, and there weren’t many more at KU while he was there. But there’s a certain excitement, a certain curiosity, at knowing there’s now one living in the apartment next to him. Once the initial surprise at the magic of the morning fades, Dean is actually looking forward to meeting his new neighbor.

When Dean gets home that evening, the moving truck is gone, and the entire yard around their apartment segment looks like it’s still the middle of June as opposed to the end of October. Ivy creeps up the side of the building next to his neighbor’s door, and beautiful blooms fill up the small flower box beneath the windows. The strangest, though, is the sprouting garden he can see off to the side, the once dry, cracking dirt now soft soil full of vegetables and fruits Dean can’t name at this stage.

Hunched over at the edge of the garden is his new neighbor, who looks up as Dean approaches his door. He awards Dean another smile, sitting back on his feet and wiping the soil from his hands. His eyes are _very_ blue.

“You must be Dean,” his neighbor says, and wow, what a voice. Dean swallows, suddenly feeling a little hot under the collar with those intense eyes on him. “Donna said you’d be getting back about this time.”

“Ah, y-yeah,” Dean stutters out, like an _idiot,_ and jeez, when did he become so easily tongue-tied by pretty blue eyes? “I teach up at the high school, so I’m usually home by six. Five when I get lucky.” His neighbor chuckles, and Dean thinks he’s already a little in love with it. _What the hell._

“Well, I hope you had a good day,” his neighbor says. “I’m Castiel, by the way.”

“Castiel.” Dean tries it out, likes the way it rolls off his tongue. It’s definitely unique, but even after just few minutes, Dean has a feeling that “unique” is just _Castiel._ “Nice to meetcha, Cas. Welcome to the neighborhood.”

“Thank you, Dean. Oh!”

Dean watches as Castiel pushes himself off the ground, wiping more soil away and carefully stepping through his little garden to approach Dean. He picks up a basketball-sized pumpkin out of the pile that Dean is just now noticing, and holds it out as he reaches Dean.

From up close, Dean can see the small blue forget-me-nots strung through Castiel’s dark hair, a literal flower crown. He gives Dean a small smile. “In case you celebrate Halloween and don’t want to needlessly spend money on one at the store. You can carve it or use it as a centerpiece or, if you want, I can teach you how to use it to make pumpkin pie.”

Dean can’t help but grin as he takes the pumpkin, shuffling his bag of homework to grade to his shoulder so he can tuck the pumpkin under his arm. “I’m more of an apple pie kinda guy, but thanks, Cas.”

“I’ve got my grandma’s cinnamon-apple pie recipe with me,” Castiel says, seemingly apropos, but Dean catches the suggestive glint in his eye. “I was going to go pick out the best apples I can find this weekend and try it out. To prepare for Thanksgiving.”

Dean laughs at this, shaking his head in fond amusement. “You’ve gotta be the only person I know who doesn’t immediately skip to Christmas.”

“I’ll be making one for Christmas too, of course,” Castiel says. “But I see no reason to skip over a reason to make pie when it’s there.”

Dean stares at Castiel for a moment, watching the way the evening sun makes his blue eyes glow. Attractive, sweet, _and_ likes pie? This must be his soulmate. “I like the way you think, Cas,” he finally says, fighting the urge to drop everything and just wrap Castiel in his arms and never let him go. _It’s been five minutes, Winchester. Chill._ “You’ll have to let me know how it turns out. I’m always happy to be a guinea pig for pie.”

Dean really likes the way Castiel’s nose scrunches when he laughs. “Are you free this weekend? You could come over and help me make it, if you like. And we can carve your pumpkin. My niece is coming to visit since it’s Fall Break and that’s what I was going to do with her.”

“Sure thing, Cas,” Dean finds himself saying, and something tells him it’s going to be a good weekend. “What time should I be over?”

“Well,” Castiel says, “I plan to go shopping early, so if you come in the morning, you’re welcome to accompany me to the store. Otherwise, I should be back by lunch.”

“Sounds good, Cas,” Dean says. “I’ll come over for lunch.”

Castiel smiles again, and Dean feels his knees go weak and his stomach do a little flip. “It’s a date, then,” Castiel says, and Dean just dumbly nods along. “I’ll see you this weekend, Dean.”

“See you Saturday, Cas,” Dean says, watching Castiel make his way back to his garden.

He stares for a moment, watching how Castiel kneels by the vines and leaves popping from the ground, his hands trailing over them and a soft, warm glow lighting up the area around him in the growing dark. The plants curl towards the light, seeming to revel in it. Castiel murmurs softly, and while Dean can’t make out any of the words, he imagines gentle encouragement and praise and love falling from those pink lips, the plants soaking it up like they’re starved for it.

When Castiel looks up at him, like he can feel Dean’s gaze on him, Dean ducks his head sheepishly and hurries to get his key into his door and push inside. He leans against the door once it’s closed again and lets out a heaving sigh. The pumpkin makes a dull thump when he lets it slide from under his arm and drop to the floor.

Ten minutes. It took him _ten minutes_ to fall for his friggin’ _new neighbor._ Who even does that? Whiny teenage brats, that’s who. And Dean is _not_ a teenage brat. He’s a grown-ass man with a master’s degree and a steady income who enjoys teaching whiny teenage brats about literature. He does not fall for strangers with pretty eyes like the endless summer sky, or a voice like a roll of thunder, or the presence of a storm contained in a single, lean body.

His head thumps against the door and he groans miserably.

Shit.

He’s so fucked.

With a defeated sigh, Dean drags himself farther into his home to change into something comfortable and make himself dinner. He eats his spaghetti with meat sauce in front of the tv and watches a few episodes of _How It’s Made_ before pulling out his grading for the night. He gets through a third of the essays before calling it quits and heading to bed.

Castiel – who quickly becomes _Cas_ – catches him when he gets home from work over the week, offering him soothing herbal teas and pleasant conversation. He talks about his day job at the local bookstore, helping children and old grandmas find their books, and about the painting he’s currently working on: an abstract piece that’s mostly splashes of color at this point. He’s always in big sweaters and worn jeans and barefoot with flowers in his hair, looking like a fairy tale forest prince or something. Dean wants to wrap him up in blankets and sit under the stars with him; listen to him tell stories in that voice like thunder while the grass and trees and wind keep them company; kiss those chapped pink lips every time he licks them absently and looks over at Dean with his bright blue eyes.

Dean is well and truly fucked, so it’s not really a surprise when he wakes up with the fleeting remnants of dreams filled with blue eyes and wet spots in his underwear for the rest of the week. He takes an extra cold shower that Saturday morning before heading out to the kitchen for coffee. After fixing himself a plate of scrambled eggs and toast for breakfast, he camps out on the couch to work on lesson plans for the coming week, just to keep himself busy.

An hour before noon, he puts his lesson plan folders in his bag and goes to put on real clothes. It takes everything in him to just grab something comfortable like he’d wear over to Charlie’s for game night instead of spending an hour and a half debating on whether or not to wear the olive green Henley that Charlie says “brings out his fanfiction green eyes” and makes his freckles look “even cuter” (he totally decides to wear the Henley). He pairs it with a clean pair of jeans and boots and then forces himself to just run a hand through his hair and not touch any of the products sitting in the back of his shelf.

He gives himself a quick onceover in the mirror. Casual, but still giving off the impression that he does make a bit of an effort. Okay. He can work with this.

Wallet in his back pocket, key in hand, and pumpkin under arm, Dean walks out the door a quarter to noon and takes the twenty steps between his apartment and Cas’. He pauses, takes a deep, fortifying breath, and rings the doorbell.

Shuffling comes from the other side, and a moment later the door opens with Cas’ smile greeting him. The forget-me-nots in his hair seem to have multiplied since yesterday.

“Hello, Dean,” Cas says, and Dean grins back.

“Hey, Cas. You ready to have me?”

Cas steps back, gesturing Dean inside. “Of course. Come on in.”

Dean steps in, glancing around the small apartment. It’s similar to his own, with the living room and kitchen to the left and the hall leading to the bedrooms to the right. Shelves full of books and small houseplants line the walls, and a comfortable-looking leather sofa dominates the center of the room, with a coffee table in front of it and an entertainment center on the wall facing it.

The kitchen has a breakfast bar, and sitting on one of the stools is a teenager probably no more than seventeen. She glances up at Dean as he enters, tying her blonde hair back from her face, and before his very eyes, white daisies bloom under her hands where the ponytail meets her head. Another witch.

“This is my niece, Claire,” Cas introduces, making his way to the kitchen. “Claire, this is Dean.”

“Hi,” she says, giving a half-smile that’s mostly just a quirk of the corner of her mouth. “I’ve heard a lot about you in the last couple days.”

Dean chuckles, feeling his cheeks flush as he glances quickly at Cas then back to her. “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” she agrees. She leans on her elbows on the breakfast bar, smirking teasingly. “Uncle Cas can’t stop talking about ‘the man with the pretty green eyes.’”

Cas chokes on his tea, coughing and sputtering, and Claire cackles with maniacal glee while Dean continues blushing in embarrassment. _Friggin’ teenagers._ When Cas mentioned his niece and pumpkin carving, Dean had been expecting a young girl, maybe seven or eight, ten at the oldest. Certainly not someone old enough to tease them about the _obvious_ crushes they have on each other.

And yeah, Dean has noticed the way Cas looks at him sometimes, eyeing him up with heated, intense gazes and subtly flirting with him. But also the gentle smiles and how they both linger outside and talk, reluctant to part ways for the night.

It’s nice to know he’s not the only one in this boat, and when Dean catches the small, pleased smile Cas gives him when they make eye contact, he figures he can weather a little good-natured teasing from a teenager.

A teenager who, it turns out, is actually pretty cool to hang out with. Claire has her uncle’s powers of nature magic, which, as he learns, is common throughout the Novak bloodline – her father has it, too. Her mother, Claire says, is human and teaches theology at KU.

“My brother’s fiancée is a witch,” Dean says, picking up one of the pencils scattered across the breakfast bar. Dean is seated next to Claire, blank copy paper in front of them ready to be filled with designs for their pumpkins, while Cas putters around the kitchen, making lunch. Tacos, judging from the mouthwatering aroma of ground beef sizzling away in a skillet, the tortillas warming in the oven, and the lettuce and tomatoes and cheese Cas has spread out on the counter. “She’s a nurse out in California.”

“Healing magic has always fascinated me,” Cas says, using a spatula to stir the meat. “It’s very similar to the kind we use, but instead of encouraging life, it encourages regrowth.”

“Dad says Uncle Cas would’ve been a healer if magic was based more on the witch instead of the bloodline,” Claire adds, sketching out a menacing face. Its grin is reminiscent of the Joker, and Dean can almost see it breathing hellfire.

Dean looks over at Cas, his movements fluid as he moves around his small kitchen. He thinks of the gentleness with which Cas handles his garden, how he speaks in soothing tones, giving love and care to everything he does. A soft grin spreads on his lips.

“He’d be the best healer there ever was,” Dean finally says, and Cas smiles over at him, cheeks red.

“Thank you, Dean,” he murmurs, and Dean finds he can’t look away from Cas’ bright eyes, his full lips, _him._

Claire snorts, and the moment is broken. “You two are disgusting. I think my teeth are actually rotting from how sweet you are.”

Dean and Cas can’t help but laugh, faces burning in embarrassment but pleased nonetheless, and Cas goes back to lunch while Dean puts his pencil to paper to draw a face for his pumpkin. He’s no artist, which is evident when he and Claire compare their faces later: hers looks much more professional than his half-hearted triangles for eyes and jagged squiggle line for a mouth. But it’s the most fun he’s had in a while, eating homemade tacos and going through stacks of paper to make the best jack-o-lantern faces he can like he’s five again.

They take their pumpkins outside to carve. Dean had finally gotten Cas to cave and help him with drawing a face, and they outline where they want to cut on the pumpkins first. Taking up knives, they carefully cut a hole into the pumpkins to empty out their insides, piling the goopy stuff in a bowl. Done with that, they set to carving out the faces, one eye at a time, then the mouths. Claire’s really does look like the Joker, and Dean’s has the air of a generic creepy clown, which he gleefully takes a picture of to send to Sam later. Cas decides to show them up and carve an entire web and spider into his.

When it begins to get dark out, Cas goes inside to grab candles, and they stick them in the newly made jack-o-lanterns to test them out. The soft, eerie glow sets the perfect Halloween mood as they set the jack-o-lanterns on their porch railings, facing the street.

Cas looks on at them in happy approval. The forget-me-nots in his hair flutter in the light breeze as Dean comes to stand next to him.

“Thank you for spending today with us,” Cas says. The little glowing pulses of firefly lights begin to surround them, and the familiar chirps of crickets in the distance create the soundtrack for a quiet night. “I think Claire enjoyed your company.”

Dean watches Claire twirl in the yard ten feet from them, fireflies dancing around her and small flowers following her steps. She likes to go barefoot like her uncle.

“I enjoyed hers, too,” Dean replies, grinning at Cas. “She’s a really cool kid. Lots of fire and spunk. She’s gonna go far.”

Cas chuckles softly. “I know. Jimmy will be over tomorrow to pick her up around lunchtime. And we still need to make that pie. You’re welcome over again, if you’re not busy.” He pauses, biting his lip, then adds, “I really like having you here.” He looks up at Dean from under his lashes, the blue of his eyes glowing softly in the lanterns’ light. His hand reaches out, and Dean lets their fingers slip together.

Dean doesn’t even bother to pretend his answer is anything other than “It’s a date.”

**Author's Note:**

> [come say hi on tumblr c:](http://chuckshvrley.tumblr.com)


End file.
